Law enforcement agencies performing investigations are often only able to obtain limited information about suspects or others involved in a case. As part of their investigations, these agencies may be able to learn of telephone numbers connected to the investigation, but have no other information related to the telephone number such as the name of the person to which the number is assigned. This leads the agency to request information from one or more telecommunications providers. These telecommunications providers are then tasked with providing information associated with the accounts of the telephone numbers. The information generally includes conventional information associated with a telephone account, including the name of the person on the account, street address, account information, payment records, and other account history.
Currently, law enforcement agencies have no means of determining the particular telecommunication provider that is assigned a specific telephone number. This leads the law enforcement agencies blindly sending information requests to multiple telecommunications providers, hoping that one of them services the number. Telecommunications providers are thus inundated with requests for telephone account information that are for unrelated phone numbers. Furthermore, before a provider is even able to conduct a records search, the provider verifies the identity of the requestor and determines, whether the requestor is authorized to make the request. Thus, each records request, regardless of whether the request is related to a telephone number served by the telecommunications provider, requires the telecommunications provider to expend time and resources.
It is with these issues and problems in mind, among others, that various aspects of the present disclosure were developed.